HULL DESIGN/PERFORMANCE: JBOATS VERSUS JPK, FIRST AND POGO.

I will be using the results of the last Fastnet to do that comparison. As everybody knows the Fastnet is one of the main European races and probably the one where we find better teams and more modern boats. They are not more because the entries are limited so it tends to reunite the cream.

JNA39

The race is an offshore one, goes from Cowes (England), around the Fastnet rock (Ireland) and finishes in Plymouth (England). Due to its course it has always varied winds. This year's edition they had light winds, medium-strong winds, and as expected, lots of downwind and upwind sailing. A great place to look at the comparative performance of modern performance cruisers, or cruiser racers.

Archambault 13

I will disregard carbon pure racers and I will be focusing at the performance of modern affordable dual purpose boats with different types of hulls. Lots of them on this race: light boats based on open solo racers like Pogo or RM, with a huge beam and the max beam pulled to the transom, main IRC type designs, heavier boats with a moderate beam and the beam not so much pulled back, like the First, boats with a smaller beam and the beam even less pulled back like the Jboats and French modern designs, with a moderate beam but with the beam pulled back like the JPK or the Sunfast.

j122

I will be looking at real times (not compensated ones) and of course you will have to give allowances in what regards the boat length. Length for length you can compare directly but not when boats have different sizes. Some will say that sail area or displacement are also important but I don't care, for me the length is what matters most and eventually price, but we will not be looking at prices on this post. I will be looking only at boats with a length smaller than 46ft.  Bigger boats are not many and not enough to provide significant data.

Let's look at the real stuff, the real-time the boats took to complete the race and let just focus on the boats that have made it in less than 4 days and 10 hours. A big disadvantage for the smaller boats, that proportionally for the same performance versus length should be allowed more time, but we have to set some limit. It is unfair for the little ones, but would allow us to see better how they compare, speed for speed with bigger boats.

Among these boats the fastest was an Archambault 13 that made the race in 3 days 13 hours 41 minutes and 08s (3 - 13:41:08), the next fastest was a JNA 39, the one on the big photo above. The JNA is a relatively new design from Joubert&Nivelt  and it could be the new 39 from Archambault, if the shipyard had not gone bankrupt, since Joubert&Nivelt were the ones that designed their boats.

The JNA39, a much smaller boat was a blast making the race in only more 7 minutes  (3 - 13:47:59), truly amazing and no wonder that they have won the Fastnet (in compensated), family crew and all.

P12.50SF3600JPK1080XP38J122

The first Jboat was a J133 (3 - 17:33:05) took almost more 4 hours than the much smaller JNA 39 followed closely by an Arcona 465 ( 3 - 18:05:04) a Grand Soleil 43 (3 - 18:07:59), a First 44.7 (3 - 18:09:56) an Azuree 46 (3 - 18:48:40) another First, a 40 (3 - 19:55:18) closely followed by a Swan 42 club (3 - 20:01:20) a XP44 (3 - 20:12:28), a X41 (3 - 20:54:24) and a Grand Soleil 43 (4 - 03:25:03).

The next was a new J122e (4 - 00:57:34) that being slightly bigger than the JNA 39 took about 11 hours more and was beaten by the First 40 by 5 hours. Then a J133 (4 - 01:41:45), another J122 (4 - 02:27:54) and only one hour later came a  much smaller JPK 1080 (4 - 03:10:22) followed by two J122 (4 - 03:26:57) J122(4 - 03:32:42) another JPK 1080 (4 - 03:43:35), a X41 (4 - 04:11:29) and another two JPK 1080 (4 - 04:11:58) JPK1080 (4 - 04:28:07).

X133

Then a First 40 (4 - 04:31:13), a  Sunfast 3600 (4 - 04:36:56), a J122e (4 - 04:37:41), an Archambault 35 (4 - 04:38:45), a Sunfast 3600 (4 - 04:39:04) an X40 (4 - 04:45:21), a Sunfast 3600 ( 4 - 05:21:56) another X40 (4 - 05:22:41) a JPK1080 and only 3 hours later the 2nd J122 came a small JPK, a 1010 (4 - 05:33:52) with a duo crew, father and son, the ones that some years back won the Fastnet and that this year won the duo crew category and also its IRC class. What a boat, what a family!!!!

JPK1080

Then another JPK 1080 (4 - 05:38:50) a First 40 (4 - 07:08:42) an A35 (4 - 07:34:45) a X41(4 - 07:52:09) a First 40 (4 - 08:44:07) a JPK1010 (4 - 09:01:52) a J109 (4 - 09:21:35) a First40 (4 -09:50:05) a J120 (4 - 09:54:00) and a JPK 1010 (4 - 09:55:00) .........Pogo1250 (4 - 13:05:45) Pogo12.50 (4 - 12:26:17) Pogo2 Class40 (4 - 13:16:27) RM 1270 (4 - 17:46:43).

For obvious reasons I had to consider the results from the Pogo out of the 4 days 10 hours limit because none of them finished inside that time. Between the last sailboat that made it on the time I considered as limit and the Pogo, many boats of similar size, and smaller, made a better time.

Pogo 12.50

Another interesting consideration regards the huge number of Jboats racing (40) probably the brand with more boats racing, being the smaller the J105. Among the boats that made it on the considered period (fastest cruiser racers) there is only one Jboats smaller than 40ft, while we can find between Archambault, JPK and Sunfast 10 sailboats considerably smaller than 40ft, some much smaller like the three JPK1010 (33ft). There were two fast J111 racing but none was able to make the race inside this time period.

First 40

So what does this tell us about hull type and performance? The main traditional development line of IRC boats (First, Grand Soleil, Swan) performed very well, even better, the "French" type of boats with a similar beam but with a larger transom due to beam pulled aft (JNA 39, Archambault, JPK, Sunfast Azuree), not so well the Jboats, that are narrower boats with a max beam not pulled back and not good at all the very beamy boats with hull derived from solo racers (Pogo, RM).

JPK 1010 and J111

On another race, with more upwind sailing and nasty seas ot with very light wind, the Jboats could have made comparatively better. On a predominantly upwind race the J would probably be the fastest, on a predominantly downwind race, like a Transat, we would see the Pogos shining and the "French" type of hulls doing even better regarding Jboats and traditional IRC racers (First, GS, XP). 

The point here is that there are not miracles and each type of hull has strong and weak points. But I would say that the type that seem to have a  better overall balance between upwind and downwind performance is what I called the "French" line of development that includes for instance the GS 34 and the Diva 34 (recent posts), none of them French boats.

Besides the French I would say that I am not the only one to think that this is the best compromise and more and more performance cruisers are designed that way. This type of hull offers also the advantage to be easier to sail downwind solo and most of all to be more stable and easy on autopilot and that is not a negligible advantage on a cruising boat, being it a performance boat or not.